Public Notice: Taking Our Toll

This fanciful artist's rendering shows a toll booth next to the Chronicle office building. The details of the road are off, but manned booths are indeed a feature of the plan, and celebrity booth operators (here it's Music Editor Kevin Curtin) handing out copies of the Chronicle could provide a lift to weary commuters. (Artist rendering courtesy of Rolf Spalio Design Firm, with photos by Jana Birchum / Getty Images)

I've written here before about the fact that the Chronicle office building is in the condemnation zone for TxDOT's planned I-35 expansion ("Public Notice: Condeming the Chronicle?" Sept. 10, 2021), along with some 130 other businesses up and down the highway. And while the Texas Department of Transportation seems intent on moving ahead with their preferred "Build Alternative 3," city planners and transit boosters continue to question the project, both in general and in its particulars.

And in the Chronicle's case, there's also an issue with the historic status of the building – once home to the Elgin-Butler Brick Co., one of the oldest businesses in the city. And that turned out to be key. With the help of the Arron Badler law firm, which specializes in condemnation cases, we were able to convince the state that the building should not be demolished, but incorporated into the design. It's taken a while to get to this point, but I'm happy to announce an agreement which we expect to finalize this Friday, April 1, that will not only enable us to stay in our building, but will provide an ongoing funding source not just for the Chronicle, but for the highway itself, while also furthering the goals of the both the city and the local transit authority.

It turns out that the solution – hammered out in negotiations between the Chronicle, TxDOT, and Capital Metro – is as old as antiquity: a toll booth. Or in fact a whole new toll system, centered on the Chronicle building, perfectly located on the northern end of the most congested part of the interstate. And while the Chronicle has historically opposed toll roads as being "an inefficient, backwards approach to providing public highways," as the National Motorists Association puts it, it turns out that when properly designed and implemented, they can be a big benefit to the community.

The historic nature of this midcentury modern brick building was key in getting TxDOT to modify their plans; the new toll lanes will be built above and abutting the building. (Photo by John Anderson)

The Personal Touch

What makes this toll design so unusual – and so uniquely Austin – are the toll booths themselves. Most modern toll roads have done away with booths altogether, in favor of a supposedly more efficient but completely impersonal system of license plate scanners and automatic billing that has led to some outrageous stories of overcharging and mistaken identities. But the ChronToll system bucks the trend, and doubles down on the toll booth experience, aiming to bring a personal touch to each interaction. Part of that is the staffing: The intent is to recruit heavily among performers and the arts community, who can bring a more lively feeling to the customer experience. To that end, TxDOT has pledged to keep wages low, to stay in keeping with the service-industry vibe that musicians and other creatives are used to. And there may be guest celebrity booth operators from time to time – either Chronicle staffers ready to talk about the issue, as shown in the photo at the top of this story, or other figures from around town, sitting in for a few hours of face time with the motoring public.

And handing out papers. Along with the building staying, this is the biggest part of the agreement for the Chronicle: Distributing copies of the paper to potentially 200,000 cars per day will instantly make us one of the largest-circulation magazines in the nation, putting us in the same league as titles like Martha Stewart Living and American Rifleman. We're aware that not all those drivers might want to take a copy of the paper – especially the commuters who might be coming through 10 times a week – but as an incentive, TxDOT has agreed to allow a $1 discount on the toll for those who take a paper – making us the first paper in the nation to actually pay people to take a copy. (Though we won't be the last; Editor & Publisher magazine has already tweeted that the "negative cover price [is] the future of journalism.")

And speaking of dollars, that's another innovation in the customer experience, because ChronToll doesn't use any traditional credit card systems; instead, payment will be accepted in either dollar coins, or in Chroins, a new cryptocurrency we're launching as part of the project. Chroins could be a whole story of its own; suffice to say, you can see the start of that marketing campaign in ads elsewhere in the issue. But the dollar coins are an idea cooked up in Washington, D.C. The U.S. Treasury Department is excited about getting those back in circulation, and the mint is getting in on the action as well, issuing a new 2022 dollar coin with the interstate highway system on one side, and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg on the other.

So instead of just a drive-through, and getting your picture taken by a robot camera, with ChronToll you get something tangible for your money, along with maybe a chat about the latest news or a tip about a hot band. And if you're thinking that all sounds very time-consuming, and not the quickest way to get traffic through the toll area – well, it turns out that's a feature, not a bug.

Connecting With Project Connect

This all fits perfectly with Capital Metro's ambitious Project Connect plan, according to CapMet planner George Mareski, who asked that he not be identified. "The whole idea is to get people to use transit instead of their cars, right?" said Mareski, after being assured that his comments were off the record. "Well, there's two parts to that. No matter how well you make transit work, it's never going to match the convenience of hopping in your car and driving right to where you want to go – unless traffic's really bad and you can't park anywhere; then the bus starts to look like a better option. And it's a lot easier to move the needle on that side than it is on the transit side. Here's an example: Say someone's trying to decide whether to drive or take the bus. One $200 no-left-turn sign can add three minutes to the amount of time it takes to run an errand in your car. Compare that to what it would cost to cut three minutes off of the bus trip – well, you probably can't even do that. So really, a lot of our focus is on making car trips slower and more difficult. This is still off the record, right?"

"If you can turn I-35 into a parking lot, that's a big win for us." This photo illustrates how many more cars fit on a stretch of highway if it's stopped bumper-to-bumper than if cars are zipping by at 65 miles an hour. (Photo via Getty Images)

Mareski went on to describe a task force he was part of, which I should note Project Connect denies all knowledge of; however, Mareski showed me a graphic (below) which he said came from that task force, illustrating how many more cars can fit on I-35 if it's stopped bumper-to-bumper than if cars are zipping by at 65 miles an hour. "If you can turn I-35 into a parking lot," he said, "that's a big win for us." Not only might some of those drivers be convinced to use transit for their next trip – there's also the sheer number of cars that are being taken off of the city streets. To the north, traffic will likely be backed up to well past Round Rock at most times of day. If they're bumper to bumper, that could be as many as 10,000 cars or more that won't be on city streets. And to the south, where most of the businesses being displaced are, the task force envisioned that the toll-induced slowdown could open up a whole new range of services, catering to the drivers literally parked at their storefronts. For instance Stars Cafe, one of the businesses in the crosshairs, could flourish and find a whole new clientele by serving curbside coffee or even migas.

Overall, the schedule remains unchanged, with construction scheduled to begin in late 2025. Now that the design is completely finalized, TxDOT will begin a robust public input process, for both stakeholders and the general public. Interested parties should sign up at my35capex.com/input.